The whereabouts of Iranian political prisoner Ali Moezzi is still uncertain since he was taken to an unknown location by agents from the Iranian regime’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security following a family visit in prison last week.

According to Mr Moezzi’s two daughters, their father’s only crime is that he is related to members of the Iranian opposition, the PMOI, and that he should have been released since he had already served his sentence, but has now gone missing without any information on his fate.

In a letter to the UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in Iran, Ms Asma Jahangir, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mr Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, and Amnesty International last week, his two daughters expressed concern over his disappearance and urged them to take immediate action to save his life.

Mr Moezzi’s case is another example that the Iranian authorities are stepping up domestic crackdown on political prisoners. It also shows the Iranian authorities’ disregard for the right to life and reveal the serious flaws of the Judiciary in Iran that has become a tool of suppression.

His disappearance is starkly reminiscent of the plight of tens of thousands of political prisoners in Iran in 1988 who went missing and were later executed by the authorities despite finishing their sentences.

The British Parliamentary Committee for Iran Freedom (BPCIF) reiterates its previous warning about the threat to Mr Moezzi’s life and urges the British government, relevant UN bodies like the UN Special Rapporteur on Iran as well as Amnesty International and other international NGOs to take urgent action to press the Iranian authorities to provide information about Mr Moezzi’s plight and call for his immediate and unconditional release.

British Parliamentary Committee for Iran Freedom

13 January 2017

Background:

Ali Moezzi, 65, who suffers from cancer and has kidney disease, is a well-known and prominent Iranian political prisoner. He has spent years in the Iranian jails in the 1980s, and was arrested again in 2008 and served a two-year sentence for visiting his daughters who are members of the Iranian opposition, the PMOI, in Camp Ashraf, Iraq. He was arrested once more in June 2011 and although he should have been released in December 2015, his sentence was extended for another year without any justification. Today, as he was expected to be released from prison but has been taken to an unknown location following a family visit last week.